Technical Field
The present invention relates to a device for guiding bracing cables in a tower of a wind turbine. This device can also, synonymously, be termed bracing cable guide. The present invention also relates to a wind turbine having at least one such device. The present invention also relates to a method for erecting a tower of a wind turbine. The invention also relates to a tower of a wind turbine.
Description of the Related Art
Wind turbines are known and modern wind turbines are usually erected on special towers, thus wind turbine towers. Fundamentally, there is a distinction between steel towers, concrete towers and mixed-construction towers which are generally made of concrete in the lower region and have a steel tower section in the upper region.
Such concrete towers or towers with concrete sections are usually, in contrast for example to common practice for television towers, constructed of prefabricated concrete segments and braced with bracing cables. The present invention relates especially to such towers or tower sections constructed of prefabricated concrete parts.
One possibility for bracing using bracing cables consists in guiding the bracing cables outside the tower wall but inside the tower. European patent EP 1 262 614 B1 describes one possible fundamental method of doing this. The bracing cables are then in principle visible and also accessible from inside the tower. This allows simple bracing of a tower, in particular from the top of the tower to the bracing foundation. Purely by way of precaution, it is pointed out here that subsequent embodiments for bracing a concrete tower should also in principle be understood by analogy for bracing a concrete tower section of a mixed-construction tower.
In any case, the heights over which such bracing cables are drawn are generally very large. This can lead to the problem that these bracing cables can vibrate and/or come into contact with the tower wall. This is in particular the case if the tower has a concave shape in the vertical direction. This means that it has, in the vertical direction, a curvature towards the inside of the tower, that is to say an inward-oriented curvature, and such bracing cables would bear against this. Movement of the cables presents the risk of damage to the tower wall and/or to the bracing cable.
To that end, it has been shown, in the above-mentioned European patent EP 1 262 614 B1, that it is possible to arrange securing elements in the tower in order to guide the bracing cables. In that case, this is for example carried out for a four-cable bundle. There, four bracing cables are guided along the tower wall in a type of bracket or attachment, which prevents contact with the tower but also prevents the bracing cables from moving in the circumferential direction.
The problem of this is that, in particular due to manufacturing tolerances, the precise circumferential position of each and every bracing cable is not known in advance. If the bracing cable is guided and then tensioned in an attachment as described therein, it is possible for substantial circumferential forces to be generated. The attachment therefore must be able to take up such forces. It would accordingly be necessary to configure the attachment therefore, and also the anchoring in the tower wall would have to be configured for such forces.